Cortana, the famous AI from Halo, will soon step into the real world as Microsoft's answer to Apple's vaunted Siri personal assistant technology.

I don't know if Apple's Siri is quite all it was cracked up to be prior to launch but it is pretty cool, and like it or not yammering at your phone is the way of the future. So Microsoft is pulling a familiar name out of its bag of tricks for its Windows Phone operating system: Cortana.

Cortana is relevant to gamers because (as I probably don't need to explain) it's the name of the AI in the Halo series who serves as an assistant and informational gatekeeper to the Master Chief. The app actually first saw the light of day back in June as "zCortana," the "z" indicating that it was a test build, but it didn't really attract any attention; since then, however, a couple of well-placed sources have indicated that Microsoft has big plans for its Siri competitor.

In July, outgoing CEO Steve Ballmer said, "Our UI will be deeply personalized, based on the advanced, almost magical, intelligence in our cloud that learns more and more over time about people and the world. Our shell will natively support all of our essential services, and will be great at responding seamlessly to what people ask for, and even anticipating what they need before they ask for it."

A couple of weeks later, Bing Senior Director Stefan Weitz described Siri and Google Now as having "a fairly shallow understanding of the world" and told CNet, "We could come out with something now like them, but it wouldn't be state of the art. It's too constrained to be an agent now. We are not shipping until we have something more revolutionary than evolutionary."

Of course, it's just a code name for an app that may very well be changed to something more "Microsoft-ish" by the time it launches ("Bing Assistant Device" seems about par for the course) but for the moment, it's a cool, fun idea that, if put to proper use, might even score the company a little bit of lasting hipness. That's something that Windows Phones could certainly use right now.

I'm curious how they'll play this out. I can see the name being changed, as "Cortana, [do x,y,z]..." doesn't flow off the tongue quite as well as "Siri..." Also, with Windows Phones natively supporting digital [Xbox] avatars I think they should totally digitally recreate Cortana on the phone. Talking to an actual 'AI' entity instead of just the phone could be one of those small edges that makes it more competitive. Of course if they do that I bet the issue of Cortana's constantly increased 'sexual appeal' will become a heated debate again.

Nicolaus99:Pff, want a GLaDOS Siri! She'd line all her answers with insults and threats.

I'd love to see that, too! Customization like that could be costly, but based on how involved Ellen McLain enjoys getting with the character I can totally see her being behind that idea. Honestly though, anything is better than "Bing Assistant Device." Seriously, that's the fastest way I could possibly see to kill off any enthusiasm for a neat product (this being Microsoft, then it's sure to happen -__- ).

Nicolaus99:Pff, want a GLaDOS Siri! She'd line all her answers with insults and threats.

I'm honestly shocked that this isn't an option by now. I know someone did a fan video of it (right?), but it just makes perfect sense to me. It would almost make me consider maybe someday thinking about purchasing an Apple product (but not really).

As for "Cortana"... does this new app come with holographic hips and Jen Taylor's voice? Cause if so it might make me consider maybe someday thinking about possibly... you know what, I'm just lying through my teeth at this point. I like Halo a lot. But not enough to go with a Windows Phone over my Android. Besides, pretty sure my Android contract gave Google a percentage of my immortal soul, so I'm already invested in their ecosystem in this life and the afterlife.

Andy Chalk:said[/a], "Our UI will be deeply personalized, based on the advanced, almost magical, intelligence in our cloud that learns more and more over time about people and the world. Our shell will natively support all of our essential services, and will be great at responding seamlessly to what people ask for, and even anticipating what they need before they ask for it."

Andy Chalk:said[/a], "Our UI will be deeply personalized, based on the advanced, almost magical, intelligence in our cloud that learns more and more over time about people and the world. Our shell will natively support all of our essential services, and will be great at responding seamlessly to what people ask for, and even anticipating what they need before they ask for it."

I'd love to believe that Microsoft might actually keep the name "Cortana" for the app (and even subtly tie it in with Halo), but the suits in charge of the whole thing will probably make it as bland and uninteresting as possible. Because that's kind of how they run things there, really.

Andy Chalk:said[/a], "Our UI will be deeply personalized, based on the advanced, almost magical, intelligence in our cloud that learns more and more over time about people and the world. Our shell will natively support all of our essential services, and will be great at responding seamlessly to what people ask for, and even anticipating what they need before they ask for it."

This is Microsoft. The only thing bigger than their pile of money is their pile of code that doesn't work.

You. are. completely. wrong.

The biggest pile is the one of stolen ideas and code. Expect to get a Siri knockoff that routs all your request through knockoff Google(read Bing)

I completely forgot about that pile. Reminds me of Q-DOS by Seattle Computer. Quick'n'Dirty OS. They rebranded that and sold that for a shit ton of money to IBM. It didn't work until v3. How the hell did these idiots get away with this?

If they had a Cortana app with Jen Taylor (the voice actress from the game) doing the voice and making quotes from the game relevant to what you are doing I might even get one of the better Windows phones, oh and it would have to have the Halo AI holographic theme. No need for boobs though.

Based on how MS have said that Cortana will have anticipatory functionality as well as reactive responses, this is more of a copy of Google Now than it is Siri. Google Now is actually useful, Siri is a gimmick.

I couldn't care less about that because I will never get a Windows Phone. Now if Google were to add somehting to Android... That would hold my interest. Well first I want them to fix Google Now. No matter how hard I try it will never play music that I have saved in the phone when I tell it to with voice commands. When I say a specific song it shows me a munch of Youtube videos for that song. NO. I got it saved on you! PLAY IT!

Based on how MS have said that Cortana will have anticipatory functionality as well as reactive responses, this is more of a copy of Google Now than it is Siri. Google Now is actually useful, Siri is a gimmick.

I can't even get it to play the music on my phone. If Cortana can do that it will be leagues better then Google Now in my eyes.

I hope that they actually get Jen Taylor to help with this, because one of these apps that actually sounds like a real human being would be fucking awesome. I know everyone's all chiming in that they wan GlAdOS, but when I heard this, I was kinda thinking it would be cool if there were more varied and human voices for the, um, "phone-assistant" apps?

It's actually a plot by Microsoft to make sure you keep buying new phones. If you keep the same phone for seven years, Cortana starts sending vulgar texts to your exes, playing music at maximum volume at random moments, and making calls to China.

RandV80:Looking at the article title I thought it meant they were going to bring her to stage for some Xbox presentation Hatsune Miku style.

Yeah, I thought it was going to be like that hologram Tupac thing that happened. And then I imagined a Halo broadway musical with hologram Cortana and some beefcake Master Chief singing about the Flood. And now I'm disappointed because I don't even have a smartphone so I can't have this Cortana thing.

They'll find a way to ruin it. They always do. Oh, sure, it sounds like a good idea now when it's just a fun little app some programmer threw together for kicks. But as soon as the suits get it under internal management, they'll fuck it up just like they did with... well, Cortana, really.